Friday, April 2, 2010

Deep Thought Thursday

If I can get some cooperation with a few of my brain cells, I'll make Deep Thought Thursday an ongoing theme on this blog, otherwise we'll have to call it "What's My Name Again Thursday". I'm starting to wonder if all of that drinking in my college days did away with all of my functional brain cells. I'm thinking all that remains are reject brain cells who make me watch Yo Gabba Gabba and lust after Jack Black, but I digress and no, that's not my deep thought for today.

Most mornings around here are total chaos. On school days from about 8am until close to 9am, everything is a blur. My husband and I rush around directing the kids to make their beds, get dressed, brush their teeth, eat their breakfast and help clean up toys. Today was not a school day but no less chaotic. Everyone was rushing around cleaning and getting ready and doing their own thing. My 16 month old snuck into his older brothers' room in the midst of all the chaos. He's not normally allowed in there because there's too many dangerous things for him to get into. Not that I keep knives, guns, and such in my kids room, there are just toys and things in there that are meant for older kids.

So in the midst of all of the chaos, the older kids' bedroom door was left open and the little tyke went right for the air purifier. There's a little bitty remote on the back of it that he loves to play with and pretend that it's a cell phone. He got it, ran around the house with it a few times talking to some imaginary person on the other end of the non-existent phone line. When he was done, he decided to try to put the remote back into the slot on the back of the air purifier. He successfully put it back in the slot and then proceeded to clap and cheer for himself. He was unaware that I was watching him the whole time.

It was at that time that I had my "deep thought" for today. I wondered what might we all accomplish in this lifetime if we were our own best cheerleaders. If when everyone else in the world lets you down or tells you that you can't do something that you do it anyway and then pat yourself on the back for doing it. If we could only focus and accentuate our strengths and focus on what we can do instead of all the things that we aren't or cannot do.

I still remember when my oldest son who is now 10 was an infant. Doctors began throwing out words like pervasive developmental delays, autism, and sensory integration disorder. Being a new mom and unexperienced with anything like that, I remember feeling disappointed that my son was not speaking or walking at the same time that every other baby was. I would stay up at night and wonder what his life would be like when he was older and how his delays would affect him. I became very focused on everything that my son wasn't doing instead of celebrating the things that he could do. I regret that to this day. It's so easy to get hung up on the negative and forget all about the positive. We could say the very same thing about focusing on what we don't have instead of all of the blessings that we do have. What good things are going unnoticed because all of our attention is on what is wrong with our lives? What is RIGHT with our lives? Probably more than we think.